Escape from Hollow Bastion
by KMSaum
Summary: Darkness comes knocking, seeking the fall of the Light. Unfortunately for them, 4 unknowing teens get caught in the crossfire. This is the story of how Cloud, Squall, Aerith and Yuffie end up fleeing HB together...sort of.
1. Chapter 1

This part of the account (mine, at least) of what happened to the Final Fantasy characters before Sora met up with them in Kingdom Hearts. Bear in mind that the situation is accurate (somewhat) in relation to the KH plot, and not that of the Final Fantasies that these characters hail from. I don't own any of these characters (sadly) but you already knew that. I know the beginning's a little wordy, but bear with me, read and enjoy. Please. And send me some feedback also! (Reviews make the story grow!) So now, without further ado,

_**Escape from Hollow Bastion**_

Mentally, they were little more than teenagers when it started.

The darkness crept up from the depths of oblivion, taking everything in its path. Slowly at first, like a predator easing into attack mode, then like a hurricane consuming all it came upon. It took their entire planet, sweeping as a wave of evil across it. It destroyed everything place by place, home by home, town by town.

Heart by heart.

It had driven them from their homes, deep in the tribulations adulthood now, they the only survivors, to the enormous castle that was the centerpiece of Hollow Bastion. The castle normally would have been an unbreakable haven, though now it was empty. Its master had left when a different breed of darkness had stolen into his world, leaving the survivors with little more than the empty shell of a fortress seemingly deserted. That was where they were now, stuck between a rock and a hard place, holding on to one another though they hadn't met before fleeing their decimated villages.

Two girls pulled at the castle's heavy doors, trying to budge their massive weight. Below them an indistinguishable wave of Heartless swarmed, climbing the rocky pedestals that would deliver them to the castle's front gates.

"They won't budge!" The smaller of the girls--the one called Yuffie--cried, sagging against the massive threshold. Her short, dark hair was plastered with sweat, her top and khaki shorts stained with dirt from the wood.

"Keep trying!" The other girl ordered. Her long pink dress was just as marred as Yuffie's clothes, though still she threw herself against the doors.

"Aerith, it's hopeless!"

"It's never hopeless," the older girl argued back and, in spite of the nagging of her muscles, shoved with renewed ferocity.

"Any luck?" That was the third of the youths that had survived the Heartless invasion. He pushed his brownish-black hair back from his eyes. It was longer than he was used to, not to mention how much darker it had gotten recently as well. His dark jean jacket billowed in the rising wind as he stood at the edge of the castle precipice, staring down with storm-gray eyes at the numerous Heartless that were clawing their way upward.

"None," Aerith resigned, joining Yuffie's lean against the doors. "I don't think anyone's home."

"Have you tried the upper floors?" He wanted to know.

"Can't reach 'em," Yuffie explained. "The floating platforms must be shut off too."

"Then we're in serious trouble," he told them, his voice quiet. Yuffie and Aerith walked over to the edge of the walkway, following his gaze down onto the mob of black beneath them.

"What do we do, Squall?" Yuffie asked. He was only a little older than she, but something about his cold, calculating demeanor made him seem like a leader to her. He motioned to the ground beside him; a glistening silver weapon laid there, its pistol-like pommel crafted with smooth black leather. "You can't keep off that many Heartless with that thing!" the young ninja shrieked. He winced in anger and turned, ready to reply, but Aerith's warning shout cut him off.

"Squall, look out!" Turning, he found the source of her worries: a shadow Heartless had made it all the way up the edge of the cliff and was already halfway through a lunge aimed directly at him. With natural skill, Squall shoved Yuffie out of harm's way and rolled to the right, dodging the creature's attack and grabbing his sword in the same fluid motion.

"Try casting Gravity on the platforms to get them down. Yuffie, help Aerith!" The girls nodded and began to cast as the boy turned, clutching the Lionheart two-handed as he readied for the shadow's next charge. The Heartless, its movements jerky, swiped its claw-like hands in a fury; Squall leapt aside each time, darting quickly from left to right. "No way am I loosing to a black blob," he informed the shadow coolly. It leapt at him, claws outstretched...

...and Squall dove behind it in the same breath, rising onto one knee and whipping the Lionheart down so forcefully its blade whistled in the whirling air. The Heartless gave a long shudder, then imploded with a small Pop! and vanished.

"It's not working!" Yuffie called again, louder now. Squall rose to his feet and replied:

"Try Gravira then!"

"Aerith doesn't know Gravira!" Squall brought his hand to his forehead, massaging the old scar that ran down over the bridge of his nose. He could hear the claws of a dozen more Heartless scraping against the rock wall just below where he was standing. If the platforms didn't move and the doors didn't open, the three of them had nowhere else to run.

Yuffie watched in silence as Squall raised the Lionheart to attack the shadow Heartless that were clambering up the side of the precipice all around him. Aerith, panting from her numerous spell attempts, came to Yuffie's side to see what she was staring at. Seeing Squall embattled, she went to charge to his aid.

"Stay back!" he shouted, not even turning in their direction. Yuffie grabbed Aerith's arm, holding her back.

"Let go, he needs help!"

"Obviously not, or he wouldn't have told us to wait," the younger girl said wisely. It was the most logical thing Aerith had ever heard her say, though it did little to appease the traitorous voice in her head that was telling her Squall wouldn't last long.

Truthfully, down below Squall found himself in an increasingly dangerous situation. There were more shadows milling around him than he could cut down. Despite the fluency with which he swung his gunblade, he never seemed to get himself free of the moving dark circle that was tightening around him. There was one larger indicator, though, that he was failing: an object thudded against him and he felt the dagger-sharp claws of a Heartless sink into his back, into the flesh over his shoulder blades. The thing's claws slid a hand's width down his back before he reacted. Straightening, he threw off his jacket, dislodging the shadow's hold and sending it back to the ground. The cuts weren't that deep, though Squall felt the painful twinge of the wounds as he pulled the Lionheart back to stem another assault. Yuffie and Aerith saw the small streaks of crimson blossom against the white of his shirt.

_This is not good,_ Squall mused, ducking to avoid another wild swing that was aimed at his head. He spun into a 360 degree spiral that sent six of the Heartless hurtling off the cliff. A blink later, though, and ten more climbed up to take their place. It was because of his attentiveness to the shadows that Squall didn't see the lumbering giant come tromping up behind him. He had no idea until Yuffie screamed, and a low growl sounded from just behind his ear.

_**To be continued...as long as someone reviews...:-)**_


	2. Chapter 2

**Welcome back. I'll keep trucking along and hopefully someone reviews. Any feedback would be appreciated (very!) The plot thickens as this goes on, too, so don't worry.**

** chap 2 **

Squall spun, and metal rang on metal. He'd never seen a Defender Heartless up close; nor had he ever seen one wield anything other than the customary dog-headed shield. This one had the shield, as well as an enormous sword--the spot where it had met the Lionheart had left a notch on the gunblade's edge. Squall held, somehow, but his arms quivered beneath the strain of the power of the Defender. The thing was one and a half times his height, its purple arms as large at the bicep as he was at the waist. The Heartless continued to force down; Squall fell to one knee, not letting the larger blade get any nearer to him.

But he'd forgotten about the shield.

The three-eyed dog snarled loudly as the Defender pressed the shield forward, trying to get the creature's needle-sharp fangs within biting distance. In unison the thing's eyes began to glow an icy blue; it was prepping to fire a Blizzara spell. Squall saw this and, biting his tongue in concentration, pressed against the Defender to try to get back to his feet. Above him, on the trellis, Aerith shrugged away Yuffie's hold and charged toward the railing, hands raised. The ninja lunged after her.

"Get off!" the older girl snarled; Yuffie took a step back, surprised at her vivacity. "He needs help!" She didn't object; Aerith--forcing away a flood of mental weariness from the Gravity spells--began to chant.

Squall managed one forceful forward shove, knocking the Defender's sword back long enough for him to roll away. As he swiveled back to his feet, though, he got a nasty shock: he'd forgotten the shield's spell. He was reminded as several icy javelins shot past him, many of them slicing long, thin cuts into his clothing and skin. It took all he could manage with the gunblade to knock the larger, deadlier ice-spears out of the air before they could hit him.

The three-eyed dog continued to pump out magic and the Defender was advancing towards Squall, shield forward and sword raised high. Squall tripped over an upraised section of concrete as he backed away; a gasp of pain escaped him as a large blade of ice imbedded itself briefly in his right shoulder. Ignoring the wedge-shaped chunk that was torn from his arm as the ice flew on, he lunged back to his feet.

"Squall!" Yuffie cried. He looked up as a glistening crimson fireball took the Defender in the back and the dog-shield's assault finally got cut short. That wasn't why she'd yelled, though. The shadows were swarming again, milling in a shifting black group that was headed straight for Squall. He cursed silently under his breath and, thanking Aerith mentally for stunning the Defender, retook the gunblade in both hands and lurched back against the smaller Heartless.

"What are we going to do?" Yuffie whispered. Aerith, panting, leaned heavily against the castle's locked doors. An instant later there was a metallic click as the girl's staff slid from its compact form to its full size. Her green eyes held a steely glint.

"We're going to help." The other girl hesitated, but pulled out her shuriken anyway.

"Okay." Together, the two of them broke into a run.

It was probably commendable that they were since the shadows were too numerous to count and the Defender was recovering from the temporary shock that the collision of conflicting elements had created. Even in the middle of a butterfly complex maneuver, Squall saw the girls coming.

"Stay _back_!" he roared. "It's too--" The sentence trailed into a choking intake of breath; Yuffie froze mid-stride, mouth open in horror. Aerith had more battle sense and picked up speed, smashing shadows out of her way as she tried to get to Squall and the dog-headed shield that had just sunk its teeth deep into his flesh.

_To be continued...hopefully..._

_Squall seems to get the crap end of it constantly, eh? It'll take more than just _his_ blade to take care of this..._


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: you know the drill…the trademarked stuff isn't mine but the storyline is…yada yada…please R&R!**

**chap 3 **

The Lionheart clattered to the stony ground as Squall, almost in shock, stared blankly down at the pale purple beast that held his right side in its jagged-toothed vice of a mouth. _Dead, _his numb mind whispered. _Dead...I'm dead._

_No!_ His rebellious side screamed back. Spitting a mouthful of fresh blood into the dog's eyes he grabbed both sides of the thing's massive jaws and tried to pry them apart. The shield responded by clamping down harder. White-hot sheets of pain shot through his body, paralyzing all they struck; what was left of Squall's strength fled.

Aerith fought on, struggling forward. She was tired from her magic, exhausted from trying to bash her way through the endless troop of shadows between her and Squall. As hard as she fought, she was making no headway. When she got to him--_if _she got to him--it might already be too late...

Like divine retribution a hail of fiery rocks came raining down from the sky, smashing several shadows and knocking the Defender into a dazed sprawl. The massive, fiery projectiles decimated the Heartless on contact, though the ground and humans within range remained untouched. A large scraping noise drew Aerith's attention upward as well. One of the floating platforms, its blue electrical current vibrantly active, was lowering rapidly directly to her right. "Meteorain?" she whispered, watching the falling missiles that harmed nothing but the evil around her, and suddenly it all made sense.

Cloud--the fourth and last of their group of survivors-- entered the battle with all the subtlety of a charging lion. He resembled one as well, violently blonde hair and set scowl lending him the air of an animal. His enormous sword sent a dozen Heartless toppling over the side of the precipice with one wide-arced swing. Electric blue eyes blazing, he looked at the girls even as he cleared Aerith's path to the floating platform.

"Go," was all he said. A distant droning noise became apparent as Yuffie, suddenly freed from her paralysis, leapt up onto the platform and out of harm's immediate path.

"Squall," Aerith muttered stubbornly, but she needn't have bothered. Across the battlefield where the Defender lay sprawled still, the youth had retaken a hold of the dog-shield's jaws. With a yell of effort, he tore the thing's teeth out of his side. It was less than a breath, though, before he collapsed, accompanied by a deluge of crimson against the sheer white of his shirt. Pocketing her staff as it snapped back to palm-sized, Aerith made to break for his side. Cloud's strong hand caught her shoulder and pulled her back.

"I'll get him. Get on the platform." Hesitating for another second, she finally nodded and followed Yuffie up onto the automated lift. Cloud didn't falter in the least, guillotining a shadow that was making to tail her as he launched back into the fray.

Across the battlefield, Squall tried to get to his feet only to fall, swaying, back down to one knee. The shadows weren't aware he was still alive, being too concerned with a certain blonde's blade to have noticed. Despite Cloud's advantage in technique over the monsters, Squall knew that he too had to be finding that shear style and power held no candle to shear advantage of number.

"Damn it." Squall searched for his gunblade but was failing: his hand shook violently as he felt around him, and his vision kept blurring. Trying diligently, though, he found the blade lying only a few feet away. The Lionheart was glowing a steady blue, its entire length of crafted steel humming with contained power. The youth drug it towards him, immediately taking a little comfort in having it back, clasping the smooth leather hilt in his left hand. His right was serving as the feeble barrier between consciousness and letting more of his essence pour out onto the pavement.

Lifting the gunblade, Squall felt the sword tingling. Truthfully its movement was more like a pulsation, a driving rhythm skipping to end in sync with his rapid heartbeat. Watching Cloud fight through the undulating lines in his sight, he began to wonder... It hadn't worked before, but perhaps then he hadn't been trying hard enough…Perhaps he hadn't been hurt enough to push himself--and his weapon--over that final brink...

_To Hell with it, _Squall mused. If blood pouring from his side wasn't enough to pull it off, nothing was. Arm wavering as he raised the glittering Lionheart to a level position, he released the safety on the pistol mechanism.

Cloud sent the Buster sword through three more shadow Heartless, recovering the energy of the blade's downswing to spin into a reverse uppercut that took two more. He had ceased to savor that telltale 'pop' and shockwave that came as he eradicated more of the twisted creatures many months before. Similarly the sweat gleaning on his forehead, arms, and inside his gloves was all the messenger he needed: he was tiring. _Too many,_ his mind told him, for the thousandth time. _Too damn many._ He was good, true, but he had to get to Squall and back to the platform quickly and it did not seem that the shadows were willing to permit that.

It was the snarl that alerted him to another threat, the same way that it had alerted Squall.

_Okay, I fixed the age thing. Not sure how you guys know that, but okay!_


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: same old story, trademarks are trademarked.**

Yikes, looks like I'm doing a little of a cliff-hanger on these chaps:-P Please R&R-I really like to hear feedback to know if I'm doing this right!

** Chap. 4 **

The Defender was back, this time with its dog-headed shield spewing a line of flame fifteen feet long. Cloud had just enough time to brace, pivoting a one-hundred-eighty degree turn and rotating the Buster sword to protect himself. The sheer width of its massive blade split the column of Fire into a y-shape, dividing the flame enough to save him from the blunt of its force.

A sound like a freight train tore Cloud's attention from the Defender to a presence behind him. Looking over his shoulder, he froze as a massive javelin of bright blue light shot towards him so swiftly that he had no time to dodge. Bracing still against the dog-shield's flames, he waited for the energy wave to consume him--

--and was surprised as the jet of blue power passed through him, some specter of another realm, there and yet not there, crashing and rending Heartless left and right whilst leaving everything else unscathed. Straining to see through the blindingly bright light, it took Cloud a moment to notice that the stream of fire had ceased. Facing front again, he couldn't suppress an open-mouthed air of shock. The Defender, in all its power, was stumbling backwards away from him, a hole large enough for a man to crawl through missing from the center of its chest. It lasted another moment before it exploded in a veil of purple mist. The rest of the battlefield echoed with the sound of shadows disintegrating in the radiating power of the shockwave.

Cloud turned as the last traces of the blue faded, its final tremors rolling over the barren, broken concrete, now completely devoid of Heartless. There were more clambering up the precipice from below, he could hear them, but for the moment the coast--and the route to the platform--was clear. Cloud broke into a sprint to the figure that, having only risen in the indulgence of his attack, was falling.

He caught Squall before he hit the pavement, wrapping an arm around his waist and getting a firm handhold on one of his belts. The loud clanging of metal on stone echoed as the Lionheart slid from the youth's blood-slick gloves, though the sound was overshadowed by a louder droning from the sky above.

"What do you call that one?" Cloud asked as he draped Squall's left arm over his own shoulder. He had to keep him talking, keep him awake until he could be healed.

"Blasting Zone," he replied, eyes clenched shut. Remembering the Defender, he added, "seems appropriate." The blonde nodded agreement as he half guided, half carried his counterpart towards the waiting platform nearby. Aerith hopped down to meet the two of them but Yuffie was again frozen in place, this time staring skyward.

"We can't let him fall asleep," Cloud told the girl as she freed him from Squall's near-dead weight. The platform was resting on the ground, though climbing onto its flat zenith required a four-foot step up. Shifting to his left side, Aerith nodded her understanding and began laboring to get Squall onto the floating dais, sitting on its edge and hauling him up after her.

"A little help would be greatly appreciated here, Yuffie," she muttered, panting.

"Like…what _is_ that?" the ninja questioned, shielding her eyes from the glaring sunlight as she stared. The droning noise had again gotten louder and a dot of color that grew larger every second became visible against the grayish white of the sky.

"Up," Cloud said simply, and Aerith caught the small smile in his voice. "While I was checking out the back of the castle," he explained, "I climbed up the large stairs in the back to see if we could enter through the upper floors. They were sealed, just like the lower ones, but then I caught sight of that."

"And what is 'that?'" Yuffie demanded.

"An airship."

"What!" the two girls shared cries of surprise; Squall's eyes snapped open.

"I tried to flag it down, get the pilot's attention, but the plane was already headed this way. All that remained then was to get back to the rest of you."

"Which you did, just in time," Aerith said quietly. Cloud nodded.

"How do we know this airship is friendly? Its crew, I mean?" Yuffie wanted to know.

"They can't be much more hostile than what we're dealing with down here." Squall was hauling himself to his knees, still clutching his right side as the crimson stain from his shoulder and side expanded down onto his jeans. His face had paled considerably, his breathing shortened, and violently dark circles were fanning out underneath his storm gray eyes. Aerith hastened to help him up, unable to suppress a pang of worry. "Are you sure he sees us?"

"I'm sure," Cloud assured him. Sure enough, the dot above them had grown considerably in its descent, taking on a form that was visibly that of an aircraft. The droning noise was that of the craft's engines. "You'll have to use a Stop spell to steady it since there isn't room for it to land. When the platform rises I think we'll just have to jump to it."

"I hope he brings it down fast," Yuffie mumbled, clutching her four-bladed weapon to her chest and watching the side of the precipice. "The Heartless are on their way back." The grating and clawing noises were competing with the sounds of the rising wind and the motor of the lowering aircraft; the shadows were not far from making their return.

A side thought occurred to Cloud and he spun, running back across the battlefield. Aerith called after him, not understanding. Yuffie could read the writing--_Highwin_d--on the side of the huge airship and knew that it was nearly time for them to go. Suddenly, though, a set of screeching cries tore through the air, louder even than the rising Heartless or the aircraft. From around the back of the castle a flock of maroon-colored birds banked hard, roaring and crying all the while.

They were far from birds, though. Their lower legs were stocky and powerful and their only upper limbs were their wide, leathery wings. Teeth sprouted from their jaws, four inch daggers of teeth, and a deformed heart was inscribed on their chests.

"Wyverns!" Yuffie cried out, though the warning was pointless. The creatures were heading on a direct crash course with the descending airship, diving at it as half of the group spiraled into a death-roll motion. The airship was not completely vulnerable, though: it opened fire on the things, two guns each on its aft and fore rotating back to fire off a barrage of bullets. Occasionally, a line of brilliant flame that could only be Firaga would shoot from an open side panel on the ship, incinerating a few of the wyverns in an explosion of crimson smoke. The craft had ceased to descend and was hovering about forty-five feet above the platform. The ingress on the side of the airship slid open and a tall, muscular blonde man appeared, staring down at the four.

"I can't come any lower--you gotta come up!" he called, and that was all. The sliding door remained open but he vanished back inside. Back on the platform Aerith, who'd been staring upward, realized that they had to move, and _now_.

"Cloud!"

"I'm coming!" he called back, and she saw why he'd raced off: his own sword was still in his right hand, though now the Lionheart rested in his left. He picked up a run back towards the dais pausing, only for a second, to hook Squall's jacket on the edge of his blade.

"Hurry!" Shadows had begun to make it over the edge of the cliff and were sauntering towards the three youths in their twisted, jerky manner. As though in answer to this the platform gave a small lurch and began to rise. Cloud picked up speed, but he was still halfway across the battlefield.

_To be continued…shortly…if people review! Your opinions matter!_


	5. Chapter 5

Wow, this one isn't that long…sorry about that. It seemed a good place to pause for a breather though devious laugh oh, um…well, just tell me what you think. R&R please!

** chap 5 **

The entrance to the castle had become a scene of utter chaos. The airship shuddered as a few of the wyverns made it in past the hail of gunfire to rip at its sides with their lethal talons. Yuffie had finally freed herself of her temporary uselessness and was swatting the dragonish creatures away from the craft with her shuriken, timing each throw to block another individual attack on the ship. Each time she loosed the weapon spun upward, a silver blur, struck its target and returned in a spiral of whirling blades to its mistress to be thrown again. Aerith shifted her support of Squall to one arm, prepping to use a spell to halt their ascent.

"Hey!" the blonde man was back in the doorway above them. "You need to steady the ship! She can't idle when she's being ravaged, you know! You gotta steady her or I can't wait for you!" He jerked forward and nearly fell as a wyvern slammed into the crown of the craft--his hold on the doorframe was the only thing that saved him. Aerith had no choice but to immediately shift her chanting to keep their chance of escape alive.

"Yuffie!" the ninja's attention shifted as a package came at her through the air--she broke off her throw to catch the heavy object, swathed in abused cloth. It was the Lionheart, blade covered with Squall's jacket to protect her from slicing her hands on the sharp metal. That caused Squall's waning attention to shift as well: they were ten feet off the ground and rising and Cloud was still several yards away.

"Throw the sword!" Squall yelled. Cloud obliged, still sprinting forward. The Buster sword flew through the air, spinning dangerously towards the people on the dais, as its owner took a blind leap.

Yuffie dropped her Shuriken and the Lionheart, watching the Buster sword intently. Timing it just right, she leapt up and grabbed the hilt. The weight of the weapon drug her down onto the platform's level surface and just missed slicing her leg as it came to rest with a loud clang, pinning her temporarily with its impressive weight. Aerith, standing stock still in concentration as she held the airship steady, teetered as she was pushed. Squall shoved himself away from her and lunged, though the force of the momentum was the only thing that gave him the strength to do so. He hit the dais hard and in the resulting wave of pain his wind was blasted out of him. Regardless, he threw his left arm out—

_That was a short one-hee hee. Anyone want to know what happens?_


	6. Chapter 6

**Welcome back! Thanks to everyone who reviewed, and I appreciate the push. Here's chap 6…and again, I don't own KH. I am planning a prequel to this story, though, to explain everything that's left to questions.**

cassidy dell—Thanks so much for putting me on your fave list—I really appreciate it!

Wolf's moon 21—Thanks to you for the same! I look forward to more reviews from you and hopefully some other folks too!

Platonic1—Gratzi, Gratzi, for the review.

Aniis—And to you—thanks for my first review EVER! I was so excited!

That's everyone so far—I look forward to reading all your stories, and please leave reviews!

** Chap. 6 **

--and buckled towards the edge as Cloud's gloved hand fastened around his own. Squall's teeth clenched hard in effort as he strained, trying to pull his comrade to safety away from the open air. He groped blindly behind him with his right hand, trying to find some hold on the smooth concrete for leverage and finding none. He tried then to force himself up, tried to pull Cloud up, but he lacked the strength for anything other than that required to hold the stalemate. In his breathlessness he faltered and nearly lost his hold; fortunately in that same breath Cloud's other hand locked over the side of the platform.

"Damn it!" Cloud heard Squall gasp, and could see the effort etched into every line of his ashen face. The blonde chanced a look over his shoulder, and felt his vision swim a bit: they were a good twenty five feet in the air and rising, and he was still dangling off the side of the platform. At the moment, his weak handhold and Squall were the only things between him and falling. Fighting for every word, Cloud heard him ask: "Can...you climb?"

"I'm trying." He was, but his boots kept slipping on the smooth underside of the rising platform. "I can't...get a foothold." Above them, Aerith was ebbing out of the sheer concentration that her Stop spell was requiring. She was too tired to hold it; too worn out from too many spell attempts to keep up a continuance on her stabilizing chant. Her mental focus slipped and the airship convulsed visibly. There were over thirty wyverns and the guns had ceased to accomplish anything. The Firaga blasts, too, had become much less frequent.

"Hey!" the blonde man was back a third time, trying to get her attention again. He was only about ten feet above her now. "Hold 'er steady, I'm going to get--" he trailed off, and even at the distance she saw his eyes widen. Chancing a look behind her, she peeked over her shoulder.

_Oh my God._ They were the first words to whisper through her consciousness as she took in the scene behind her: Squall, lying flat and seeping blood onto the concrete, trying to pull something over the edge of the platform and doing so without success. It was when she saw the spikes of blonde and realized what--_who_-- he was trying to save that her mental hold on the Stop spell slipped again. This time, though, the platform was the thing that suffered from her error: the airship tottered in the air as a pack of wyverns slammed into its other edge, causing the side that the door was on to rock downward. The forewing knocked against the dais and it halted in its ascent, shaking violently.

Cloud felt his left hand slip off the ledge, and for one horrible second he felt Squall lurch halfway over the edge with him. The other youth recovered and twisted halfway back up, though, sliding sideways and pulling up the few extra inches Cloud needed. He allowed himself a short thought of relief as his left hand found its hold again.

"Too close," he panted. Squall nodded a little. Too tired to speak, he was fighting himself again, trying still to muster his strength and pull Cloud onto the platform.

Aerith thanked God silently when the dais stopped shaking and she could see that the guys were still hanging on. The blonde man from the airship had signaled her once more to hold on also, and was running two long wooden planks side-by-side like a bridge between the ship and the platform. She had to freeze and keep her mind clear--she had to hold onto the Stop spell for just a few more moments...

She felt her heart skip a beat when she heard Yuffie's cry of "I'm coming!" She should have been reassured that she was going to help the others, but she was gripped instead by a wave of sudden foreboding.

Squall made it to his knees, panting, managing by some grace of heaven to get one of his legs underneath him. The strain was almost too much, but if he could just pull a little harder, get Cloud a little more leverage, then he was sure he could—

--but then he cut off with the closest sound to a scream he'd ever uttered as five slim fingers dug into the open wound on his right side. Just as the dog's bite had done, the resulting flood of angst struck down all the strength he had mustered. He didn't have any time to compensate, to try to recover from the loss or the shock by pulling back--he just fell, fell forward as his consciousness vacillated into darkness. He didn't even remember what was going on as he let his arm go slack, nor did he feel the pull of the other male that was threatening to drag him down too.

His weight was jeopardizing them both and Cloud, in the split instant he had to think, knew it.

So he let go.

He felt the sickening inertia as the muscles in his left arm buckled and gave under his own weight. The feel of the air swirling around him in freefall and the sight of the platform and airship made him feel oddly blank. He was falling, faster than he would've thought possible, and somehow he didn't care. The others were safe, and as long as they were going to escape he was at ease with whatever happened next.

Battle training took over as he hit the solid concrete: he rolled, spreading out the force of the impact, but not before he heard the snap. _Thirty feet's too far for that old trick to work_, he mused, climbing shakily to his feet. He found the problem when he tried to assume his fighting stance. One, his sword was still on the platform high above and two, his right ankle couldn't hold an ounce of his weight.

"Wonderful," he muttered aloud, but he had little time to think about it. The shifting mass of shadows was more than enough to remind him of that. "Just wonderful." It was less than a blink before the first Heartless leapt.

_Was that acceptable? Yes or no? I'm really getting into this one, I think, and I'm planning a prequel that explains everything about Cloud, Squall, Aerith…please R&R, and thanks so much for those of you that have already!_


	7. Chapter 7

Hi everyone! Thanks to everyone who reviewed, and please R&R! You know the disclaimer…so here's the good stuff.

**Chap. 7**

Above him, safe on the dais, Yuffie leapt from a fainting Squall like he was infected with a contagious disease. She stumbled away, staring horrified at his blood on her hands. _I didn't--I didn't mean to grab him around the middle, I was just trying to help... _Her mind was retching, reeling at the realization of what she'd just inadvertently done: she'd just caused the loss of one more life and once again, just like it had been with her village, it was that of a friend...

_It wasn't my fault_, she assured herself. _He was falling anyway...Squall wouldn't've held. I was just trying to help...I didn't even stop to think..._ There was no quieting her conscience just then, though, so she left Squall on the ground and busied herself gathering up the weapons she'd dropped in her hurry to help.

_I...failed him._ It was becoming harder and harder for him to form thoughts in his head, but there was enough of Squall's consciousness left to make him aware that another one of his comrades was gone. Just as Cloud had, he succumbed to a wave of complete stoicism, not caring that his breath was growing shallower and more difficult to draw each time he exhaled.

_I liked him,_ he realized offhandedly, and was mildly surprised. He hadn't acknowledged any such thing since…well, since before his own home had been demolished by Heartless. The past tense of his thoughts didn't really register within his clouded mind just then: Cloud was still alive but so was he...for how long was the actual issue.

There had been competition between them, he knew, a palpable sense of rivalry. It had been just enough to make their sparring sessions a little more serious, though in the time they'd traveled together the better of the two had not been conclusively decided. Cloud was all power but Squall was fast, as lithe as his comrade was strong. Depending on the moves each made and their state of mind, one would beat the other once and then lose the next time around.

_Funny how…things...end up._ Below him, Squall could just see the battle through his blackening eyes. Cloud was limping badly, fighting off the shifting mass of shadows as well as a flock of wizard Heartless that were hovering just above the fray. There was no emotion left in Squall now: his thoughts grew more disjointed and his consciousness was ebbing, just as his life force was ebbing. As he faded, he acknowledged one final thing: _at least the girls are safe._ He felt nothing as he coughed blood onto the concrete before him, cared less than an ounce that the only feeling in his entire body was the constant stab of unrelenting pain from his side and shoulder. The last image he registered was a wizard's glistening fireball shattering against Cloud's chest; Squall grimaced as the warrior stumbled backwards, dangerously close to left side of the precipice. A shadow leapt and Squall looked away as Cloud, jostled hard as the creature hit him in the same place the fireball had, stumbled further still. He teetered at the brink before finally losing his balance and careening over the side and down into the abyss below. Squall clenched his eyes shut.

_I'm...sorry Cloud._ He passed silently, though the reaction in the surrounding scene was akin to a Molotov cocktail's explosion. Aerith finally lost her grip on her Stop spell when she heard Yuffie's loud curse; shaking herself out of her dazed trance, she looked above her at the airship. It was suddenly devoid of motion, hovering steadily in tune with the hum of its engines, its attackers having pulled back and regrouped a short distance away. The wyverns kept their altitude, seeming to watch the platform, none of them moving but to flap their large wings. Understanding, Aerith spun.

She noticed two things immediately: first, Squall had gone limp, entirely still, and second--she noted with horror--Cloud was gone. Dashing to the side of the dais she slid to her knees and stared desperately over the edge. Down on the damaged concrete below, the shadows and wizards had frozen just as the wyverns had and, just like the other creatures, were looking directly back at her. It was disconcerting to say the least, but there was something more disturbing still.

"God no, no please..." She couldn't see him. The battlefield was crowded with nothing but Heartless, _no_ _one_ but Heartless. Looking to Yuffie she saw the ninja's thin shoulders shaking. She didn't even have to ask--the younger girl was pointing, her hand quivering as badly as the rest of her. "Did he..?"

"Over the side," was all she whispered. A ringing screech drug an unwilling Aerith back into reality as a wyvern dive-bombed the platform. She pulled her staff out and extended it just in time to beat the creature away, though she realized had it curved closer it would have had her. Unless, perhaps, it hadn't been _aiming_ for her.

Well, I finally updated! Tell me what you think—more soon!


	8. Chapter 8

Yayness—chapter 8 is up! Thanks to everyone reviewed:

Platonic1—the most recent reviewer! Thanks…and post on your story!

_You all know the drill…I don't own what I don't own. PLEASE R&R!_

**Chap 8**

_Of course._

Cloud was...gone, or the Heartless would've been pursuing him. Instead, they were going after a different target, and a heart locked in a prone body was by far the easiest mark. The creatures of darkness had no qualms about cutting off the weakest member of the herd. They were predators, and all predators cared only about was where their next meal was coming from.

The flock of wyverns charged as one then, spiraling down on the dais like they had done the Highwind. Aerith leapt back to her feet and assumed a guard position over Squall's inert form.

"Come on!" the girl cried defiantly. There was a fierceness in her now, a voice crying out for penance. The first of the wyverns that reached her got its head beaten in with one hard strike of her staff and fell from the air off the side of the dais. The two behind it, though, she couldn't hit--her spells had slowed her down far too much for effective combat. The second creature raked her arms with its talons and pulled away as she faltered. The third, though, was headed straight for her face, strong legs forward and claws outstretched.

She heard the popping sound and was left facing a sharp edge-- the point of a spear. Aerith exhaled sharply, startled at the speed the blonde man possessed despite his size. He turned and cut down another two Heartless in one figure eight before shouting, "Don't just stand there...move, damn it!" Yuffie caught the hint--he'd aimed the order at her-- and hobbled up the ramp into the ship, dragging the Buster sword and carrying her Shuriken and the Lionheart. "You too," he commanded, nodding after Yuffie. "We gotta get the hell outta here _now_."

"Right." She bent to grab Squall as the man destroyed another pair of wyverns. Hardly through his attack he bent and grabbed Aerith's arm, pulling her back up and giving her a shake in the process.

"I said _move_, damn it! We ain't got all day. Bat 'em out of the way so I can get through with him, then go!" She sized him up for a moment, then nodded. It was no time to start doubting him now, not when he'd swooped out of nowhere as their only escape. She set her feet shoulder's width apart--just like Cloud had always said to, to keep her balance-- and began swinging at the diving wyverns. She was too busy fighting to have time to think about him, and she would only have time to mourn later if they made it out in one piece.

The blonde pilot knelt beside the downed youth, carefully rolling him over. He grimaced at what he saw: Squall's entire right side was saturated with blood and there was a thin line of it running from each side of his mouth. _Kid's not got long,_ he realized. He lifted him as circumspectly as he could, tying to be quick but delicate as well. It was not a reasonable combination, he knew, but he had little choice as he hoisted the youth up as he stood. He expected a cry, at the very least a whimper of pain, but he got nothing but silence. _ Shit_..._this is worse than I thought._

"Come on!" Aerith ducked under another wyvern strike and hurried to follow the man carrying Squall. They ran up the ramp and the man turned sharply left, reaching for a handle on the wall. As he pulled it a shelf-like a cot lowered near the floor. "Close that door, girl!" Aerith winced--he shouted so _loud_--but she saw his point. She managed to get the sliding metal sheet shut just before a wyvern got through. As it was, the creature slammed into the door head first, denting it visibly on the inside. "Mick, get back here and help this kid. He's in really bad shape, and we gotta go before these bastards tear up my ship any more."

"You got it." The new voice was high pitched and slightly annoying, nasally but oddly regal all at once. The pilot's chair spun around and a figure only about as tall as Aerith at the waist hopped off, relinquishing the seat to the blonde man. This new male was, in all look, a giant mouse caped in black. A heavy chain and pendant not unlike Squall's Griever hung around his throat, though his was set with a crown. His large eyes shadowed as he took in Squall's condition. Brow furrowed he asked, "Where do you keep the medical kit, Cid?"

"Above the left middle panel," Cid--the pilot--replied. He was pressing buttons all along the ship's enormous front consul with amazing speed and precision, and the girls, unused to flying, nearly fell as the Highwind lurched into motion.

"Grab the kit for me, will ya?" the mouse-man asked, pointing. Aerith followed his direction and, opening a large cupboard that was as high on the wall as her shoulders, hauled out a large metal box with a red cross painted sloppily on the side. She set it down by the mouse's side, opening it for him. "Thanks," he gave her a brief smile before his brow furrowed again and he started rummaging through the kit. He stopped searching when he found a small, sharp knife. "What exactly happened to him?"

"A Defender's shield bit him," Yuffie piped up from her place in a seat along the opposite wall. She'd sat down hard when the plane had surged into life and now was clutching the bench for dear life. "The chunk out of his shoulder was from a Blizzara shard." The mouse nodded, leaning over Squall with the knife poised. Aerith was a little nervous from the noticeable turbulence as they flew; the wyverns were still in pursuit. He had no trouble, however, deftly cutting a perfectly straight line from the neck of Squall's shirt to its waist. When he peeled the ruined fabric away, there was no sign of any knife-made cut on Squall's torso.

There was, however, a set of wounds in the shape of a crescent gouged out of him on his right side, in what was a clear definition of a dog's frontal teeth, as well as an array of long, thin cuts. The bite holes were elongated, a testament to how hard Squall had struggled against the Defender. Aerith gasped in pity; Yuffie, already feeling green from the motion of the airship, closed her eyes and tried to think happy thoughts.

"I need some towels, quickly. I don't have enough magic for this right now," the mouse muttered, apparently thinking aloud. Aerith called forward the request to Cid, who yelled back the location of some in another random shelf in the cabin. By the time Aerith had fetched them and brought them back, the mouse was lifting a bottle of what looked to be wound cleaner. "Thanks," he murmured offhandedly. "You perform Cure, right?"

"That, as well as Cura," Aerith responded, a little snappish. It felt like he was belittling her--any idiot could learn Cure, as easy as the chant was, and applying it wasn't _that_ hard. She was at her nerves' end and the stress of the situation had left her attitude bare and capricious. "They didn't teach upper level magic in my village--I picked up on Cura by experimenting with Cure," as a side thought she added, "I have no energy left-"

"-I know. I have little myself." Then...

"You were the one setting off the fireballs. Was that really Firaga?"

"Yes. Hand me another towel." She obliged him, realizing she was thankful that he was there. Slowly, carefully, the mouse was mopping out the teeth wounds on Squall's side, using a combination of the fizzing liquid in the bottle and the towels to clean them out and soak up the seemingly endless flow of blood. Aerith knelt at his side, doing what she could to assist him. She was drained physically as well as mentally, not to mention magically. That still struck her as being very bad, given the increasing saturation of the towels and the inhuman white of Squall's complexion.


	9. Chapter 9

xsaturnine—Thanks for reviewing…multiple times! I have heeded your advice/command—hee—and have taken it into consideration in this chap. Kind of… anyway, Thanks! ps--I fixed the ages, here and in Prequel. How did you know he was 3 yrs older?

Platonic1---Yup, drama drama drama! And you finally updated! –glomps-- What a place to stop though? I need details about this kidnapping of yours! Thanks again for reviewing—and I'll leave you a nice long one soon-(I wanted to reread first.)

Thanks to my reviewers…I love you! To the rest of you, please R&R—I love ALL my readers! Lol.

-K-

**Chap 9**

"How's he doing, Mick?" Cid questioned from his place in the front of the ship.

"It isn't working," he replied. "The antiseptic doesn't help the wounds close. I'll have to...yes." He looked at Aerith. "Watch closely if you want to learn. I can only do this once." Straightening, the mouse spread his hands palm down about three inches from Squall's right side. He took a deep, steadying breath as he delved into what little magic he had left.

A pearly shimmer framed his hands and the wounds he was concentrating on, growing in power to a blinding white light. A loud curse sounded in the cabin: Cid did not like being blinded from within his own ship. Aerith forced herself to stare into the brilliant glow, now dotted with green--_it has to be Curaga--_ and watched in awe as the skin around the lacerations seemingly began to lengthen, shortening the distance between its edges and consequently closing the wounds. She could feel the raw power of the spell, could sense the trace of life energy the mouse was using to fill in the gaps of the magic that he needed and didn't have.

The white light broke off abruptly, fading into nothing in the space of a blink. Mick, as Cid had called him, stumbled back a few steps and sat down hard on the airship's metal floor.

"I couldn't close them all the way," he told Aerith tiredly. "It should be enough, though. Bandage him up, will ya?" She nodded again, too engrossed in everything around her to speak.

_It was just too much_.

Everything in her world had fallen in upon itself and collapsed _again_ in less than the space of an hour. Her movements were automated as she pulled gauze and a roll of bandages out of the medical kit and slid in closer to her injured comrade's side. _How did we let this happen?_ None of it made sense, the way they'd all been together that morning and had been torn apart so quickly. She remembered it all, the things they'd said to one another; she and Yuffie checking supplies, Squall and Cloud sitting over an old map of the castle and trying to decide the best way to get inside. Cloud had been staring at the old parchment, chin propped on his hand as It had all been so routine by then, so normal. Allowing herself a small sigh, she dismissed her thoughts by pressing the gauze carefully against Squall's side, beginning to wind the binding around his torso, pulling tightly yet moving in a detached, mechanized way.

She was halfway through her third rotation when a hand locked around her right wrist. Startled out of her trance, Aerith glanced down at the blood-slick glove that had stopped her.

"Where's...Cloud?" The unwelcome question came through a set of clenched teeth. The tempest blue eyes were open, barely, still possessing that chill they'd had since she'd first met him, though there was a difference to them now. They were plagued, afflicted, glassy, devoid of their usual vitality. His grip was not particularly strong either and Aerith knew then, at that moment, Squall was just as helpless as she had always feared herself being. He was afraid too, she knew--in the short time she'd known Squall, she'd learned enough to know that helpless was not him. Neither was being afraid, though, and there was something that could be called nothing but relentless fear lurking beneath the other layers of shrouded emotion in those eyes.

Slapped by the sight--and more by the reality of his question, one she had not wanted to face--the girl bit her lip to contain a quiet cry.

"He's gone for now." The mouse was back on his feet, standing at Aerith's side. A different kind of pain crossed Squall's face; releasing Aerith's wrist he moved to rub his old scar, saw the crimson on his black glove and grimaced. He let the hand drop back to his side instead. "You should not be awake yet, not by a long shot. I must've had more energy than I thought," Mick chuckled a little, but it was an anxious sound. He face looked drawn. "This isn't good. Will you help me?" he asked Aerith.

"Sure. What do you need?"

"Just give me your hand." She held out her left, since that was the side he was standing on, and he took it in his own. Opening his own left hand over Squall's chest--the youth's eyes were clenched shut again, as tightly as was his jaw-- he muttered something to him. It sounded strangely like "sorry" to Aerith.

She felt a sudden pulling inside her mind and body, though it wasn't a physical feeling. She'd never had her magic tapped before but there was no doubt that that was what he'd done; as proof a short, sharp burst of brownish-orange light lit the cabin for all of a second. Cid gave a roar of indignation, as well as a stream of curses, at being momentarily blinded again, but this time the light faded much faster than the Curaga spell had. By the time Aerith's vision had cleared and her head had stopped swimming--there had been life energy in what he took-- Squall had slumped back, face contorted only slightly now and body deathly motionless on the cool metal shelf. The girl felt a sudden upsurge of fear.

_----------------------------------------_

_Well, I'm getting near to the end of what I have pre-written for this fic. It has 2 pending sequels and "_Prequel," _so "Escape" will end in less than 20 pages, I'll bet. the storyline WILL continue, but for obvious reasons it needs to branch. hee hee. Anywho, please R&R, and let me know. Hopefully I'll have time to write more son--college kills the creativity in me!_

_-K-_


	10. Chapter 10

Mysteryguy12—thanks for the double review…you could review ten times and I'd still be squealing with delight! AWESOME fic from your end, too, and thanks again for the kind words!

xsaturnine: --prods back-- Yayness! I am assuming Mick can do magic, I just felt it would make sense. He used it in KHCoM, anyway. Thanks for reading…and here's a new chappie!

Platonic1—Yayness! Thanks for reviewing again, and for the love of the one-winged angel update! Your fic ROCKS!

Thanks to everyone who reads this, and please, as usual, R&R!

-K-

**Chap 10**

"What did you do?" she demanded. The mouse caught her tension and smiled tiredly at her, raising his hands in a submissive gesture.

"Calm down, I didn't hurt him. It was just Sleep, nothing more." He glanced at the once-again prone figure beside him. "It's not a common spell any more, but I'm glad I learned it. He had to be in terrible pain. I didn't want to leave him like that." That made perfect sense. Squall's bandaged chest rose and fell evenly, though the breaths he drew were slight and shallow. His skin, she recalled, had been hauntingly pale even before the spell. Aerith blushed.

"I'm sorry, I--"

"Nothing to forgive," the mouse dismissed, with another smile. "Had it been my friend I would've been suspicious too. No, I think he'll be okay, especially if he was tough enough to wake up that quickly."

"I thought that you did that with your Curaga."

"I did, somewhat, but I didn't give him near enough to bring him around. I was trying to close the wounds and stop the bleeding, but he must've seized some of the energy subconsciously and used it to wake himself up." He scratched a large, black ear. "I've never seen anything like it before." It was then that he noticed the unfinished bandaging job. Aerith caught his meaning and nodded, moving to finish her task, musing about her mangled thoughts.

Out of nowhere the odd pair in the Highwind had swept in to rescue them from a world where, presumably, no one else still existed. The mouse-man had helped swat off wyverns with stronger magic than any she'd ever seen and, subsequently, had pulled out a level of Cure beyond her and had saved Squall's life with it. None of it added up.

"I don't understand this: we've been wandering around fighting for months, looking for survivors or help and finding none. I had almost given up hope--" _I'm still on that brink, _a part of her knew "-but then you two showed up. How did you know how to find us? How did you even know we were alive?"

"Ask Mickey," Cid called back from the pilot's chair. "He's the one who guided me here. 'Said something about destiny, and he gave me some swanky bullshit about carriers of the Light."

"Fate whispers," the mouse said, a little cryptically. He ruined the effect by adding "With ears like mine, you can't help but overhear." Aerith was still puzzled--more so, in fact.

"That makes no sense."

"But it does," Mickey argued. "I have certain...connections to the Light, the only real weapon anyone can use to fight the Heartless: you know, those creatures that appeared on your planet. There's one specific person I'm looking for--the one the Light has chosen to destroy the Darkness--but there are others that have been marked by Fate to help turn the tides back against evil." He smiled at Aerith and, in a sweep of his short arms gestured to her, Yuffie and Squall. "Namely, you guys. You know it took the Heartless months to gain control here, right?" Aerith nodded; Yuffie groaned quietly, looking increasingly ill. "It doesn't usually take that long; hours, typically, perhaps a couple days or a week at most. Between the four of you, each from a different area, you held off the darkness's advances for far longer than it usually allows."

That didn't make sense, either. Aerith knew that she herself had managed very little against the Heartless when they'd invaded her village and knew Yuffie, the youngest among them, had been forced to turn tail and run from her home. Cloud and Squall were different stories...but that was beside the point. When the Heartless had come to her village that fateful day long before, she knew that _she _had not prevented any deaths.

And now, today, she'd failed again.

"I have never managed anything against those things...the Heartless," the girl whispered, head down. Her voice quivered not with sadness, but with long-suppressed rage. "Never have I done anything commendable against the creatures that attacked my home. For you to give me the credit for stalling them is just plain _wrong._ The ones that slowed them are incapacitated," she motioned curtly at Squall, "or...gone."

"For now," the mouse insisted again. He seemed unfazed by Aerith's uncharacteristic unstableness. "You will meet him again someday" there was no need to elaborate on who 'him' was "-in another world, perhaps. But you are wrong in calling yourself useless. You did more to help than you will ever realize. Speaking of," he looked at the thin talon cuts on each of the girl's biceps, the mark of one of the wyverns, "I should clean those out for you. It's hard telling where a Heartless's claws have been and you wouldn't want it getting infected." Aerith looked down and sighed, nodding after a moment's contemplation. As she sat down on the cool metal floor she heard Cid ask:

"So, what's the plan now, Mick?"

"As soon as I am sure this boy is stable enough, I have to go and continue searching for the key."

"Key?" Aerith questioned, hissing a moment later at the sting of the antiseptic in her cuts.

"I'll explain it to you a little later, once we've rested and are finished with patching you both up." He was deft at that action, Aerith noticed, as he was already wiping away the small runs of blood from her arms and was winding them with bandaging the same way she had done Squall's torso. His movements were more focused than hers had been, and twofold more precise. "I nearly forgot about his Blizzara injuries. I'd have looked just great to the Light if I'd let one of the Touched slip off because of a shoulder wound..." the mouse caught Aerith's look, a mixture of puzzlement, exhaustion and wariness. "The carriers I spoke of earlier are sometimes called the Touched by those who research the Light and the Darkness. I am one of those people, but" he raised a hand, silencing himself, "all of that can wait. It _will_ wait." He tied the last knot on Aerith's left arm and stood, turning back to Squall. "I don't think I properly introduced myself. My name is Mickey."

"_King_ Mickey," Cid corrected from the front. "Stop being so damn modest, Mick. This fella saved my ass about ten days back," the pilot explained to the girls, lighting up a cigarette. "I got overrun by some of those goddamned wizard Heartless and couldn't get off the ground. Tricky bastards, those wizards. Never did like magic users," he added, spitting the phrase 'magic users,' "Cheating bastards, the whole lot of 'em." Mickey chuckled. "Anyway, when I told him I was in his debt, he said that flying to the castle and rescuing you kids was all the repayment he needed. It was a damn good deal, so here I am."

"I still don't understand that," Aerith mumbled. Mickey's Curaga had healed up the minor cuts Squall had all over him and he was working diligently on the youth's shoulder, the only mildly serious wound he had left to be tended. He was nearly out of wraps.

"You don't need to right now. Besides," he tacked on, nodding at his patient, "how upset do think he'll be if he wakes up clueless and you completely understand what's going on? Meaning no disrespect, but I don't really want him turning that sword of his on me."

"I get the picture: you don't want to tell me anything right now. Fine." Aerith was tired of fighting, thinking, feeling...she just wanted to rest. A strong, sudden desire to sleep nearly drove her into a faint. Once again, Mickey surprised her by catching on.

"There--finished. Cid, will you come back and put him on a bunk so that he can rest? I think Aerith could use one as well." _How _does_ he do that?_ the girl wondered.

- - - - - - -- - - - -- - - - --

_Well, there we go. One step closer to the end of "Escape!" cries I do love this fic…and I've just begun the first of the two prequels. I also wrote a FFVII Advent Children one-shot. Anyone interested?_

_-K-_


	11. Chapter 11

_Hello everyone! I just wanted to throw in a quick disclaimer about the content of this fic. Firct (and obviously) the characters aren't mine. Second, I have taken extreme creative liberty with the storyline. Though I fixed their ages, the time lapse of the characters is way off (it's gonna be that way in the sequels and prequel, too.) Sorry if this bugs anyone, I know it bugs me, and just let me know in the reviews. Thanks for reading! Please R&R! _

yuffiegal23--here's your update! Thanks for reading!

xsaturnine--AC is indeed consuming, I've watched it 5 times full through, but I've watched a certain character's return scene 39 times! --eyes bug out-- Thanks for reading, and I'm going back to your fics when my stupid exams are done!

Platonic1--Thanks again as always, and keep plugging away at that fic! I _just_ started "The Twisted Blade," one of the sequels...

**Chap 11**

"Sure. I think we finally shook those goddamn bird Heartless, too." Cid stood, rubbing a hand along the consol affectionately. "Knew she had it in her. No Heartless is as fast as my Highwind." The pilot's steps were sure even past the swaying movement of the airship's motion and he lifted Squall into his arms with the same easy certainty. Aerith climbed shakily to her feet, finding herself a little awestruck at the gentleness of the muscular man's hold on her injured comrade. She had initially thought him brash with his loud mouth, foul tongue and seemingly perpetual glower, but perhaps there was more to it than that.

"Coming Yuffie?" she asked, breaking her own line of thought. It was time to concede to the little voice telling her to analyze later, sleep now. The other girl groaned and shook her head, an odd motion considering that it was currently between her knees in an attempt to ward off her airsickness. Aerith shrugged--if she wanted to stay there, more power to her.

Aerith followed Cid towards the back of the airship, taking the left hall as the main path branched into two. The pilot raised a booted foot and kicked an electronic panel, and a room on the right side of the hall became visible as the metal door slid open.

"In here," the blonde man muttered, speaking around the cigarette in his mouth. The room was small, arranged more for space than for comfort, and sported two sets of small bunked beds of either side of it. All the wall space that wasn't dominated by the beds was lined with rows of sleek metal drawers, all of varying sizes. In the sparse floor area that was available, shirts, over worn boots and old blue jeans were piled everywhere. "Not used to company," Cid explained, again using his foot to do the work of his occupied hands. It took him but one well directed sweep to clear to clear the lower, rightmost bunk of the pile of clothes it had been buried beneath. The pilot laid Squall on that same bunk. "Sorry 'bout the mess." He grabbed an armful of what looked like a mix of socks and oil-splattered rags off the top bunk. "'Hope this'll do."

"Anything will do," Aerith replied politely. "Thank you."

"Sure. If you need a blanket they're..." Cid looked hopelessly at dozens of identical drawer fronts, "...somewhere. Dammit." He took a long drag off his cigarette, gave the girl a shrug and exited, smashing his fist into the door's console to do so. Aerith watched the door slide closed before she made her way up the metal rungs to the top bunk.

"Anything indeed," she mumbled, tossing the last of the socks to the growing pile on the floor. She allowed herself a small sigh as she tried to get comfortable when one more thing came to her weary mind. Leaning down over the side of her bed, she took a quick appraisal of Squall's appearance.

He was sleeping still, breathing shallowly but evenly just as he had been. His brow was slightly furrowed; she couldn't help but notice the way his scar looked the same, regardless of the crease of his forehead around it. The first thing she had noticed about Squall when they met was that scar.

_Analyze _later_; rest _nowthe sleepy voice commanded again. Yawning, Aerith rolled back.

- - - - - - - - -

"What the friggin' hell do you mean, 'space-worthy?'"

"Just like it sounds, Cid," Mickey replied tiredly, stifling a yawn. What a trying day it had been. "The modifications we made with the gummi blocks I gave you, remember? You have extras in the hold and I'm sure you'll find plenty more in Traverse Town."

"Not _that_ damn place again. I already told ya-"

"And _I _already told _YOU _that there is no other way. You have to get them out of here. The balance is too far upset in Hollow Bastion; Touched or not, you're all little more than Heartless bait if you remain. You yourself are a target, but they _especially _cravethe young ones." At that Cid sighed, rubbing a gloved hand over his face. Mickey glanced back at Yuffie—who had managed to doze off with her head still clenched firmly between her knees—and lowered his voice. "What's wrong? There is more to this than you not trusting the gummi blocks."

"They…they don't remember me. Not one of them knows who I am." Mickey smiled ruefully at the older man.

"A lot has happened between then and now. They were _tiny_, Cid, little more than toddlers at best. How can you expect them—"

"—I don't." It was Cid's turn to interrupt. "Not really. I just thought that perhaps, you know…"

"They are tired," the King reminded the pilot, patting his muscular shoulder affably, "as are you." He heard Cid grumble "_Tired my ass…"_ beneath his breath, but ignored him and continued. "Just give them time, see how they end up, all right?" He glanced ahead, out the Highwind's front windshield. "Now, are you ready to take her up?" Cid, banishing his temporary melancholy, grinned the grin of a man possessed. He still wasn't sure, but space was _space_, and Mickey had yet to mislead him…

"Well, if you say so. What the Hell—Traverse Town it is!"

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

_Well, there are **2 chapters** of "Escape" left. I just finished….and I can't believe it! Stay tuned…I believe they're being posted very shortly!_


	12. Chapter 12

_This one's a bit off the main line, but it opens the door for the prequel…hmm. Please R&R!_

**--Chap 12--**

'The dark clouds pitched and rolled, thunder sounding in a tumultuous chorus amid the flashes of lightning. It took a few moments more for the sky to break but when it did it did so with a vengeance, releasing a cascade of raindrops that quickly became a torrential downpour.

Squall Leonheart walked through the threshold into his small home, completely drenched from the rainfall and handling it with a stoicism only he could manage. Pushing dripping brown hair out of storm gray eyes, the youth hung up his ragged jacket and tucked his gunblade and sheathe--his only valuable and, truthfully, most prized possessions-- into the corner beside the door, hardly turning to do so. The shanty was more than unimpressive, but for the most part it functioned as he needed it to. The single room he had entered served as foyer near the door, kitchen near the small fireplace on the right hand wall and bedroom on the rear opposite side. It was from behind him, from the tattered mattress he slept on, that the voice came.

"Something on your mind?" Squall hissed in surprise and spun, pulling the small knife he kept hidden in his jeans' pocket into a ready position; his entire body shifted into a tight defensive stance in a breath. The response from the bed came as little more than a giggle. Squall, understanding but not relaxing, muttered a well-rehearsed word. A small, glistening fireball took shape before his extended left hand and launched, on his unspoken command, into the open hearth. The Fire took hold on the wood within and lit the dark hut as thunder shook the place from rafters to floorboards. The figure on the bed rose and stretched lazily, still giggling. "So tense. You _really_ have to lighten up some." Squall did relax a bit then, slipping the knife back into its concealed sheath and planting one hand firmly on its corresponding hip.

"I thought I told you to stop sneaking in here," he muttered, angrily but abashed--he hated being taken by surprise and trained against it, yet somehow she always managed to catch him unaware. The thin figure laughed heartily at that, ambling over to him with a distinct sway to her walk.

When she reached his side, Rinoa turned her face up to look Squall in the eyes. "I know you did but...surely you wouldn't deny a poor girl shelter from the rain?" she questioned innocently, smoothing her sky blue over-dress. Squall sighed at the cherubic cheerfulness shown so blatantly in her liquid brown eyes. Her skin, as perfect and porcelain as any doll's, flickered vividly with the light from the storm outside as lightening split and crackled across the sky.

"No," he conceded, looking out through the open door at the rain pounding the ground. His lean, muscled form tensed again visibly as Rinoa snaked a thin arm around his waist.

"See, was that so hard? It's easier to be kind than to shut me out." He always tried to do just that, but she managed to disarm every defense he tried to erect between them. "So good with Fire..." she whispered, holding onto him while glancing at the roaring hearth, "...and yet so cold." Her thin hand settled against the hard line of Squall's jaw, pushing against it until she forced him to look at her. Rinoa's smile deepened as she brushed that same hand against his cheek, tracing from just beneath his eye to the tip of his chin. "You have such a handsome face. I wish I could see you smile--I'll bet you're even cuter." Before the detached warrior in him could react, Squall felt the slim woman beside him rise to her tip-toes and lean in closer, all while he seemed ensnared in some spell from those eyes of hers. It was a breath later when he realized her lips had closed over his own. Some distant part of him cried for him to pull away, to retract and run from this strange experience; much more loudly, however, the unequivocal warmth that was coursing through his body argued otherwise.

Rinoa melted against his chest, wrapping her thin arms around his neck and burying her slim hands in his thick hair. As he normally did, Squall felt detached from the world around him, though for the first time in his life he was not alone in that: Rinoa was there with him, and somehow the two of them had stepped out of the realm of reality and into a place where location didn't matter and time held no sway. Something deep within Squall (though he was by no means fully aware of it) wanted everything to freeze, keeping the small, pretty female in his arms forever. He had truly managed to relax in Rinoa's arms, and closed his eyes. It felt to him like an eternity had coerced itself into the breath that the kiss actually took.

Squall felt his head snap back on his neck, torn backward by fingers interwoven into a fistful of his hair. Sharp nails dug into his scalp; by the feel of it, those fingers had become little more than jointed claws.

- - - - - -

Rinoa's form stretched, shifting out of a shape that could be called anything remotely human. Arms lengthened, shoulders spiked upward, all vital signs disappeared. She grew a good three feet as her beautiful brown eyes glassed over and her clothing melted into one being with her skin. Her new body's color was a mix of light purple and sky blue and, barely distinguishable as skin, held a texture and elasticity not entirely unlike that of rubber. All of this transpired in an instant; Squall had no time to snap out of his trance and recoil.

The hands that had been cupped behind his head doomed him. Just as Squall had assumed they, too, had changed; even as he struggled those claws were put to work holding his head back as Rinoa's free hand, out now in his line of sight, shifted to become a single, deadly spike. Her—_its_—right arm was now a feasible weapon, drawn back and poised for a kill. There could be no doubt about where it was going to end up, either: the monster had a clear opening to the flesh of Squall's exposed throat.

Squall tried to wrench loose as that needle-sharp point descended and couldn't, so he chose in that same instant to fight instead. Rearing back further, he snapped his right leg into the creature's midsection. The creature's aim was thrown off; as he had hoped, and the unforgiving point on the end of its arm swung out wide as it narrowly missed tearing open his throat.

It did not swing out wide enough.

The very edge of the tip caught the soft tissue under Squall's left eye, cutting a deep and perfect line over the bridge of his nose. Wincing in pain, he forced his eyes open through the blood to see the monster poised again, this time with its lance of an arm in line with his chest…'

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

_Well, there's just **1 left!** It's open-ended, I'll warn you now, cuz I have the sequels in the works! They take liberty w/ the story too…ah well. Thanks for reading, please R&R!_

_-K-_


	13. Chapter 13

**--Chap 13--**

Squall sat up quickly, nearly braining himself on the metal of the top bunk above him. He was subconsciously clutching his face, his fingertips pressed against the rough skin of his scar, shaking his head.

_It didn't happen like that. _His mind was reeling, _screaming_ that phrase over and over again.

_It didn't happen like that._

_It didn't happen like that._

_IT DIDN'T HAPPEN LIKE THAT! _

_Damn the Heartless._ It _hadn't _happened like that, and now it seemed as though all of his fights against the Heartless were causing his nightmares to twist his memories.

Memories were all he had left of her. He was not going to let them be tainted by the nightmares, by the stress of fighting against the monsters that had stolen her away from him.

"You're awake."

Aerith was standing at his bedside, her trademark smile on her face. It was forced now, lacking her usual lovely easiness. There were dark circles under her eyes and her hands were outstretched slightly, drawn back apparently in surprise. "You were…shouting in your sleep--her name." She cocked her head sideways, looking at him closely. Her gaze was so intent on his face—on the troubled, tired look on his face—that Squall averted his eyes. "Are you okay, Squall?" she questioned. He flinched.

"I'm fine," he lied, still rubbing his scar. Aerith sat down carefully on the bunk, squeezing in beside him as he twisted his body to let his legs drape over the side. He hissed a little as his wound pulled at the movement.

"After all this time, do you think no more of me than that?" she inquired. "I'm not stupid, you know. You lost a lot of blood—at the very least, you have to have some vertigo."

"…Whatever." That startled a chuckle out of her.

"I haven't heard you say that in a long time, Squall." He grimaced again. She lifted a hand, "I napped long enough to get my strength back. Another Cure--"

"No more spells," he muttered. "That mouse knocked me out last time."

"That mouse's name is King Mickey, and he saved your life." Her voice was kind and quiet, not at all as denigrating as it might have been a few hours before. With a short nap had come the revival of her normal, tranquil attitude and she was back to acting the way she always did—levelly.

"You had us really worried there for a while."

"I wasn't all you were worried about." Now it was _she_ who grimaced; Squall's voice lowered as his head did. "I'm…….sorry Aerith. For everything. I know how much he meant to you-"

"-Don't." Squall looked up at her from the corner of his eye, not wanting her green orbs to meet his own. "You can't…no. You're the mean one, remember?" He _almost_ smiled at the old epithet. Almost. "Besides, none of this was your fault. None of it was any of our faults."

"…Grow up."

"What?"

"I said, 'grow up.'" There was the old animosity, the old ice. "This isn't a fairy tale, Aerith, and there's no happy ending waiting on the horizon, no sun behind the clouds. In case you hadn't noticed, the clouds are pitch black." He wasn't trying purposely to hurt her—the cloud metaphor was out before he realized it—but helplessness was not an emotion Squall Leonheart was used to coping with.

A slim hand was patting his knee.

"You have demons, my friend." The girl stood, giving him a forlorn smile before turning to ascend to her own bunk. "You really shouldn't try to fight them alone." Squall frowned, hand still tracing the old rigid line over the bridge of his nose. He let her words sink in, and then swung his legs back onto his bed with an involuntary grunt of pain. It didn't take long for his breath to even out and deepen a little.

He wasn't awake long enough to hear the soft tears falling to the sheets above him.

……_**.The Beginning…….**_

…_well, that's it folks! The End! …Or is it? I have more in the works, please R&R!_

_-K-_

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